Nine-year-old Chinese girl gives birth…

A nine-year-old schoolgirl has become one of the world’s youngest mothers after giving birth to a 6 lb baby by caesarian section.

By Malcolm Moore in Shanghai
03 Feb 2010

The baby was delivered on January 27 at a hospital in Changchun, in the North Eastern Chinese province of Jilin, when the girl was eight-and-a-half months pregnant, according to a local newspaper.

The City Evening News reported that the girl and her child were both well, but that her parents have lodged a complaint to the police.

Under Chinese law, intercourse with a child under the age of 14 is statutory rape.

A nurse in the ward told the newspaper that the girl’s family was from Songyuan, a nearby city of around three million people, and that she “looked very mature” but it was unclear how she had become pregnant.

The hospital declined to comment on the case.

China has launched a nationwide campaign to preserve the innocence of its children, banning any sexual content from the internet. Secondary school pupils are often suspended or expelled if they are suspected of having sexual relationships.

However, critics point out that there is a need for proper sexual education in order to combat the fast-rising number of teenage abortions. According to statistics from one hospital in Shanghai, almost a third of abortions are carried out on school pupils.

Last year, a clinic in the central city of Chongqing was criticised after advertising half-price abortions for anyone with a student card.

Advertisements for “Student Care Month” showed a schoolgirl wearing uniform, saluting and saying: “I am a student, I have special rights”.

The youngest girl ever to have given birth is thought to be Lina Medina, of Peru, who gave birth at five-years-old in 1939.